Not Your Typical Financial Journey {Part 3}

 

If you missed the first two parts of this series, you can go back and read how I was brought up to be a frugal girl, and our high-flying first year of marriage.

After 2 years of wedded bliss, I graduated from college. My feet would not touch the ground – I had an education now, which meant I could get any job I wanted. Not.

The following Fall was a humbling experience for me. I “tried” to be content at my banking position, but it’s not like I was moving up the promotion line anytime soon. I had to find something that would use my brains, my creativity, and give my entrepreneurship streak a run for it’s money.

It gets complicated

After a few too many episodes of Cake Boss, I decided to take all the cake decorating classes at Michaels Arts & Crafts. I loved it, and thought I did a fairly decent job, so, I had to try my hand at making money with it.

Lest I bore you with my cake business successes and fails, the endgame was this: I couldn’t sustain the business in a depressed part of New York, with lots of red tape and no dish washer in sight except for my husband and I. Do you know how greasy frosting is?

Anyway, let’s just say the price point of what my product was worth, and the price point of what customers were willing to pay, didn’t meet up. And it left me burnt out and exhausted. I don’t even think I’ve picked up a piping instrument in about a year. Yes, that bad.

So, in the meantime, I had to find something else that worked.

I dabbled in medical transcription, a payroll business, Etsy….really, I was desperate and could not sit still. I wanted to use my degree and I wanted to own my own business!

Time for a new idea

Joseph and I had just started looking at houses, when a brilliant thought formed in my insanely overactive mind. Why couldn’t we buy a duplex, rent out one half, and become landlords?

Immediately, a Barnes & Noble trip was in order. I scoured the Real Estate Investment section and typed out titles on my phone, so I could order them from Amazon later at a cheaper price. Is that bad?

After a lot of research and prayer, I finally convinced my husband that we could do this. Not only would it help our first mortgage, it could potentially be our answer to an alternative retirement plan.

That is, if we enjoyed it.

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